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“Here,” she said gently, passing Paige more paper towels. “It’ll be all right, I promise.”

Paige didn’t respond. Why bother pointing out that nothing ever would be all right again when Charlotte didn’t understand what it was like to be Kelly Durham’s victim or to have her dad walk out and her mum fall apart? Charlotte’s life was so totally different, with her together parents, her boyfriend, her freedom to move about the school any way she wanted to, that Paige could only imagine how lovely it was to be her.

“Come on, we’re already late,” Charlotte said, looking anxiously at Paige’s hair. “Do you have a scrunchie or something to tie it up with?”

Paige shook her head.

Charlotte didn’t have one either. “You’ll have to plait it,” she decided.

“We don’t have time.”

“Do it as we go.”

A few minutes later they crept quietly into their geography class, where Mrs. Spinetti was already handing out last week’s homework. “You’re late,” she barked. “You know I don’t tolerate…Paige, why is your hair wet? It’s not raining.”

Paige’s heart hammered as she tried to think what to say. She could feel everyone’s eyes on her, especially Kelly Durham’s, daring her to cough out the truth. “I—um, I spilled something on it,” she mumbled. “Some paint, so I had to wash it out.”

“Actually, miss—” Charlotte began.

The teacher wasn’t listening. “Well, we can’t have you sitting here dripping all over the place. Go and see the nurse, get yourself sorted out.”

Leaving the class, Paige returned to the girls’ toilets, where she carried on drying her hair with paper towels before going to her locker and taking out her coat. She felt sick to her very core, so wretched, ugly, and hated that she wished she could just disappear and never have to see herself or anyone else ever again.

A letter fell from her locker, and she stooped to pick it up. Seeing her name in cut-out newsprint letters on the front, she felt herself choking with misery again, and she stuffed the letter in her pocket.

They were never going to leave her alone. This was never going to end, and she couldn’t stand it.

She wasn’t really sure where she was going now; she just had to get away from here. And if she ended up being run over by a bus somewhere out on the Bryn, or murdered by some pervert who might be hanging around in his creepy van, she really wouldn’t care one bit.

—

Jenna was pulling into the drive with Josh and the twins in the back of the car when her mobile rang. Seeing it was Charlotte, she turned off the engine and clicked on.

“Mrs. Moore? Jenna?” Charlotte said urgently. “Is Paige with you? I’ve been trying to get hold of her.”

“No, I don’t think she’s home yet,” Jenna replied. “I guess you’ve tried ringing her?”

“Yes, but her phone must be out of battery. Never mind, I’ll try Hayley to see if she’s with her.”

Not sure if she should be worried, Jenna rang off and opened the back doors for the children to spill out and run into the house. They’d have to go out again in a quarter of an hour to get Josh to athletics, Wills to rugby, and Flora to dance. However, there should be enough time for them to wolf down some cereal and dash to the toilet while she sorted out the various kits and leotards they needed to change into.

To her relief, when she followed them into the kitchen she saw that her mother had dropped off a pile of ironing. However, to her dismay not a single item that she needed right now was amongst it, which probably meant it was either in the wash, on a floor somewhere, or stuffed in the bottom of a bag.

Leaving them to help themselves to Cheerios, she set off in search of whatever she could find, and came to a sudden stop when she realized Waffle hadn’t leapt all over them as they’d come in. She was about to call him when she heard the thump of his tail on the landing.

She found him lying outside Paige’s door, looking pleased to see her but apparently not inclined to move.

“Hello, sweetie,” she whispered, going to smooth him. “Is she in there?”

His mouth parted in a sort of grin as he wagged his tail again.

“Paige?” she called out, knocking on the door.

No reply.

“Paige? Can I come in?”

When there was still no answer she gingerly pushed open the door and peered inside. Paige was lying on her bed facing the wall with her coat and boots still on.

“Are you asleep?” she whispered, going to her.

It seemed she was, because she didn’t move as Jenna sat on the bed and reached round to feel her forehead. She didn’t seem to have a temperature, but she’d been working hard lately, so she was probably just exhausted.

After fetching a small duvet from the linen cupboard to cover her, Jenna said, “I’ll be back by six. There’s plenty in the fridge if you want something to eat, or Grandma should be home by five if you want to go and see her.”

She waited, but there was still no response. Since she had no choice but to leave her if she was going to get the others ready in time, she tiptoed out again and ran downstairs to break up a fight.

In the end they were late for everything, with everyone in a terrible mood. Wills was furious at having to wear a pair of Josh’s shorts with a safety pin in the waistband to hold them up, Josh was complaining at having to wear the wrong-color kit, and Flora was shouting that she hated her mother for forcing her to wear a Care Bears pajama top and the lime-green tights they’d bought specially for her appearance as a leek at last year’s harvest festival.

As soon as she was back in the car, Jenna tried calling Paige. Finding herself going to voicemail, she rang Charlotte instead to let her know that Paige was at home and to ask if Paige had been ill during the day. However, Charlotte wasn’t answering either, which wasn’t a surprise once Jenna remembered that tonight was the first tennis coaching session of the season. Paige should have been there too, and since she loved tennis above most other sports and had been vowing to beat her mother by the summer without, as she’d put it, being allowed to win, Jenna wondered again if she might be coming down with something.

As she toyed with the idea of asking her mother to pop in to check on her, her mobile rang. Seeing it was Jack, she braced herself and clicked on.

“What can I do for you?” she asked shortly.

“I have a couple of things I need to tell you,” he responded, “and I thought…I was hoping now might be a good time.”

Tensing around the flare of hope that everything was falling apart with Martha, she gave him no encouragement to continue.

“First up,” he said, “I don’t want you to worry about repaying anything the company owes. Martha has offered to take care of it.”

Jenna’s eyes closed as the enormousness of the gesture seemed to drown her. “Lucky you to have a rich girlfriend,” she murmured. “She must love you very much to be turning a blind eye to the fact that you cheated all those innocent people out of their money.”

Not rising to it, he said, “Perhaps you could tell your lawyer.”

She didn’t bother to reply.

“The other thing,” he continued, “is I thought I ought to let you know that I’m going to be away for a few weeks.”

As the words registered she sat very still, as though not moving could stop this from going any further.

“Are you still there?” he asked.

“Yes, I’m here. Where are you going?”

“To the States. Martha and I have some business in Boston and Seattle, and we thought, as it’s going to be close to Easter by the time we’re done, that we’d fly her children out for a holiday after.”

Jenna’s mind reeled, and she tried to breathe but found she couldn’t.
He
and Martha had business; Martha had children who he was going to spend Easter with, in the States, where his own children had never been but would love to go.

What could she say to that? What words existed in the English language that could even begin to express how she felt right now? Since she could find none she simply ended the call.

—

A while later Jenna was sitting in the dining room, staring out of the window, barely registering what was going on around her, though she’d heard Paige come downstairs a moment ago and start talking to Josh.

Was Paige all right? Hadn’t she been in bed earlier, with her coat on?

Where were the twins?

Remembering they were down at her mother’s, she tried to stir herself, but her limbs felt so heavy she could barely move. Maybe she’d taken the wrong dosage of Valium, but she’d needed to take something to keep herself breathing.

“What
is
that?” she heard Paige demanding.

“Peanut butter and noodles,” Josh answered through a mouthful.

“You’re kidding! Mum! Do you know what he’s eating?”

Jenna didn’t answer.

“Mum!” Paige shouted, going into the dining room. “What’s the matter with you? He’s eating peanut butter with his noodles, for God’s sake.”

Jenna turned round.

“Josh is eating—”

“Yes, I heard you, and you shouldn’t be eating that, Josh. It’s not good for you.”

“I don’t care, it’s my favorite, and you said I could have anything I wanted with my noodles.”

“Then I guess we’re lucky you didn’t choose jam or cottage cheese.”

“Ugh! Yuk! Yuk! I hate cottage cheese.”

Jenna felt Paige’s eyes on her as she got up and went to take a bottle of wine from the fridge.

“Would you like a glass?” she offered Paige.

“No, I wouldn’t,” Paige retorted, “and I don’t think you should either.”

Jenna’s eyebrows rose. “Why ever not?”

“Because…”

Jenna waited.

Paige colored with anger and frustration. “Because you’re like you are,” she cried, “and wine won’t help.”

“Then what will?”

“I don’t know. Dad coming back, I suppose, but—”

“But we know that’s not going to happen, so I’ll have a glass of wine instead.”

Taking the bottle from her, Paige pushed her onto a bar stool and said, “When did you last eat?”

Jenna blinked with amusement.

“I said—”

“Paige, why don’t you make something for yourself and stop worrying about me?”

“Do you think I want to worry about you?” Paige exclaimed heatedly. “Hasn’t it crossed your mind I might have better things to do? And I don’t want to be worrying about him and the twins either, but someone has to or our whole family’s going to fall apart.”

“Don’t cry.”

“I’m not.”

“We’ll be fine.”

“Have you seen Dad today? Is that why you’re like this?”

“We spoke on the phone,” Jenna told her.

“Did you row?”

“No, we didn’t.”

Paige looked at Josh again. Grabbing his bowl, she carried it to the bin and emptied it.

“Mum! Mum! Did you see what she did?” Josh cried angrily. “She stole my tea.”

“Yes, I saw,” Jenna replied. “You shouldn’t have done that, Paige. He was hungry.”

“I’ll make you some proper food,” Paige snapped at Josh. “What do you want?”

“Peanut butter and noodles.”

“Don’t be stupid. What about pasta and—”

“I don’t want pasta.”

“Egg on toast?”

“No! I want—”

“You’re not having it, so
shut up.
I’ll make some nachos. You like them.”

Slightly appeased, since nachos were his next favorite to peanut butter, Josh watched as she took out a bag of tortilla chips and scattered them over a baking sheet.

“Do you want some?” she asked her mother as her phone bleeped with a text.

Jenna shook her head. “There’s some guacamole in the fridge,” she said, wandering through to the sitting room.

Finding it next to the salsa, Paige took out both cartons and reached for her phone. Seeing the message was from Kelly, she tried not to open it, but couldn’t stop herself.

No words, just a photo—the same shot they’d used of her before, but this time it was attached to a totally naked body striking the kind of pose that belonged on an Internet porn site.

“What’s the matter?” Josh asked as she struggled not to cry.

“Nothing,” she mumbled, closing her phone down. The last thing she wanted to do now was make nachos, but Josh was waiting and her mum was on another planet and so all she could do was carry on spreading the salsa, grating the cheese, and adding some chile flakes.

“Dad!” she seethed into her phone half an hour later. She was in her bathroom with both doors firmly closed so no one could hear. “What happened when you spoke to Mum today?”

“Ah, so you’re talking to me at last,” he responded. “I knew it—”

“I said
what happened to Mum
?” she broke in furiously.

“Nothing happened. Why?”

“She’s acting really weird. I don’t know what to do.”

“Tell me what’s wrong with her.”

“I don’t know. She’s strange, like she’s not really here, but she is.”

“Where is she now?”

“Lying down. The twins’ll be back soon, and I don’t want to be the one to put them to bed.”

“Then ask Grandma to help.”

“Mum should be doing it. I want
her
to do it, because I want everything to be normal, but it never will be now, thanks to you.” Cutting the line dead, she slid to the floor and buried her face in her hands.

A moment later he rang back. “Paige, listen to me…”

“No! You listen to me. You haven’t got the first idea of what I’m going through. You don’t even care.”

“Sweetheart, calm down, please. I know you’re upset, and that things are difficult right now, but we can work through it. Let me meet you at school tomorrow.”

“No! As long as you’re living with that witch, I don’t want you to come anywhere near me.”

“Please don’t call her that.”

“Witch! Witch! Witch!” she shouted. Ringing off again, she closed the phone down completely and squeezed herself into the tightest little ball she could manage, as though it might keep everything and everyone in the whole horrible nightmare of her life from getting to her ever again.

—

“What’s going on?” Jack demanded down the phone to Jenna. “Paige has just rung me in a terrible state saying there’s something wrong with you.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me,” Jenna informed him, “and I don’t want to speak to you, so kindly get off the line.”